Inside the Minnesota Twins with beat writer Kelly Thesier of MLB.com

Time changes and other morning updates

The Twins are scheduled to take on the Netherlands today at Hammond Stadium in a 2:05 p.m. ET start, which is an hour later than normal Spring Training day games. The players seemed as confused as anyone by the time change. Baseball is a sport that’s based upon habit and although today’s game just meant pushing back everything an hour, it seemed to get most of the players out of their usual routines.

As for news this morning, we talked to Nick Blackburn about his sore left knee. He said that he woke up on Friday morning, the day after his start in Sarasota, and noticed his knee was swollen. Doctors told Blackburn that might happen due to the arthroscopic surgery he had on the knee this offseason. Blackburn said this was the first time he’s experienced the swelling since the surgery, but doesn’t expect it to be a long-term thing…”I don’t see this going into the season,” he said.UPDATE: Blackburn threw a seven-minute bullpen on Thursday morning and felt nothing. The plan is to have him throw another bullpen in two days to test the knee.

Joe Mauer reported that he expected to have small setbacks like the one he experienced the other day as he makes his comeback from kidney surgery. “You have to try out and see where you are at,” Mauer said.

Closer Joe Nathan is scheduled to throw to live hitters during batting practice this morning. If he doesn’t feel any soreness in his shoulder, then he likely will return to game action this weekend.UPDATE: Nathan threw 28 pitches during his live batting practice session and said afterward that he hasn’t “felt like that in four years. That’s about as good as I’ve felt in a long time.” In total, Nathan threw around 40-50 pitches with his side work before the session. The plan now is to have the closer pitch in Sunday’s contest at Fort Lauderdale against the Orioles.

All right, here are your lineups today. The Netherlands starting pitcher is right-hander Tom Stiufbergen, a Twins prospect who missed the entire 2008 season as he recovered from right shoulder surgery. Another familiar face to Twins fans will also be in the dugout for the Netherlands. Bert Blyleven is the pitching coach for the team.

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